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Switching off stress

This morning on the tube, a woman with a bad spray tan and an even worse attitude took umbrage at my presence behind her in the packed tube carriage and began jabbing me – hard – in the back with her bony elbow. Tempted as I was to rise to this provocation, I instead plastered a serene smile on my face and went back to my Kindle. Life is stressful enough without letting complete strangers on the daily commute take further toll on the mood.

I don’t know if it’s because I’m mentally preparing myself for going ‘offline’ on Sunday, or because my stress levels are sky high due to the pressure of organising a fundraiser for a hundred people tomorrow night (or maybe both), but I’m actually looking forward to switching off, physically and metaphorically, for a few weeks. As well as being interested in what effect this online hiatus will have on me, I can’t wait to create some quiet space to relax, to write and to dream.

Because lately I’ve felt my old adversary anxiety begin to rear his ugly head. And I know from past experience the only way to elbow him off the bus of my subconscious is to take a step back from life, see the bigger picture and realise that most of the minutiae of daily life (Facebook statuses and tweets included) simply does not matter. My world will go on turning without social media. It’s just a shame I can’t turn off aggressive people on crowded tube carriages for a month too…